National Arbitration Forum Decides 61 Year Identity Theft Victim Owes $46,000 Yahoo! Finance has a horrible story about a 61 year old lady living on $759 a month Social Security whose credit card was stolen and it ended up with the National Arbitration Forum (NAF) deciding she owed them $46,000.When she received notice of pending arbitration against her, it had no claim attached to it. She didn't even know who was suing her. She sent a letter asking for the case to be dismissed or to be served with an actual claim. She didn't hear from them again until NAF told her they had ruled against her for $46,000. They didn't even respond to her motion.Takeaway: Scan your monthly credit card statements for any charges you don't remember making and report them as soon as possible. Also, arbitration by companies against consumers is evil. Support the Arbitration Fairness Act. Stacking the Deck Against Consumers. Read More on the horrors of Binding Arbitration...

Stacking the Deck Against Consumers
"I said I wanted to see the signatures -- who had signed for these purchases? And they wouldn't give me that," says Lieber. "They said, 'You're responsible, this is your credit card.' I ignored them because I thought they were nuts." Lieber sent a letter demanding the agency cease contact -- which debt collectors must do under a 1996 federal law. But they continued to harass her and her spouse, Theodore, who was confined to a wheelchair following a stroke. Frightened by a menacing phone call, Theodore sent a payment to the collection agency...Lieber heard nothing until another notice arrived, stating that MBNA had won a $46,000 judgment against her in arbitration. "Lieber never even had the opportunity to see what the claim was against her, or put in a defense," says Wilner. "They ruled against her without responding to her motion."

HANO contractor denies Jackson got him job
U.S. Housing and Urban Development Secretary Alphonso Jackson said Thursday he will cooperate with investigators after questions arose about how one of his friends got nearly half a million dollars for work at the Housing Authority of New Orleans, which currently is under the oversight of the federal government. Jackson, who testified before Congress this year that he doesn't intervene in awarding contracts, acknowledged he may be under investigation in a case that involves just that. Others connected to the case say HUD's inspector general and the FBI have seized HANO equipment and have asked questions about Jackson's possible role in HANO's hiring of Jackson's friend, South Carolina construction contractor William Hairston. Hairston's construction company was hired by HANO in January 2006 and subsequently won a no-bid "emergency" contract awarded to Hairston's construction company in July 2006.

Entries Tagged 'Housing And Urban Development' ↓
HUD officials have noticed that some FHA lenders are charging borrowers points and paying $4,000 to $5,000 to brokers for simply bringing a customer to their office. Brokers that are not approved by the FHA cannot take a loan application or close an FHA loan. HUD rules do allow nonapproved brokers to refer borrowers to FHA lenders.

US Home Foreclosure filings up 99% from September 2006; Top home builder says 68% of its prospective buyers cancelled orders in the company's fiscal fourth quarter Home builder Beazer reported that 68% of its prospective home buyers cancelled their orders in the company's fiscal fourth quarter, which ended Sept. 30th. The cancellation rate was almost double the 36% of customers who cancelled orders and gave up deposits in the prior quarter.

Homeowner's 'nightmare'
In the wake of recent comments by attorney K. Brian Hanna about local contractors who are perfomring shoddy work on houses, some homewoners affected by this malpractice are now sharing their "horror" stories... Six months after moving into her new home, Davis said she is left dissappointed and feels cheated. "They left a lot of crooked walls, all the windows are crooked, every plumbing fixture in the house is leaking," she said, adding that those complaints are among many others, including unhealthy mould growing on her walls as a result of the flawed work, countertops that were never installed and a garage door that she had already paid for but has yet to receive.

Shelby County Home-Builder In Deep Trouble
The Cordova-based home-builder faces 98 tax liens for thousands of dollars in unpaid bills to banks, subcontractors and vendors.  The unpaid vendors include Waste Connection of Tennessee, the owner of those filled-to-the-brim dumpsters.  The builder is advertising foreclosures on its properties in Hernando, Mississippi.  Cadence Bank, a Starkville, Mississippi-based bank, has sued Matthews Brothers in Shelby County Chancery Court for a million dollars.  The bank claims Matthews Brothers' promissory notes are delinquent.

Probe disrupts housing repairs
Fuqua family members thought they were getting a sweet deal when they received federal grants to rehabilitate their New Brunswick home. To them, it meant a new kitchen, a working bathroom, stairs that didn't threaten to crumble below their feet and a roof that wouldn't leak every time it rained. But a year after receiving $23,000 in grants, their Seaman Street home is still in disrepair.  "It was a great program the government had for poor people to beautify their homes," said 45-year-old Alfonso Fuqua. "Now look what has happened because of crooks." 

LA Times: Stuck in a housing glut
ARE you a homeowner who is having trouble selling your house? National housing experts say you can heap some of the blame on those big builders with their much-ballyhooed sales and the banks that have put too many foreclosed homes on the market. And if that isn't enough to banish those Goliaths to Dante's Ninth Circle, some experts also hold them responsible for dragging down existing homes' sale prices in certain parts of the nation -- including communities in Southern California.

Bombs May Be Buried Under 54 Homes; Crews To Dig Up Properties
Live explosives possibly buried under more than 50 homes in an Orange County neighborhood has prompted plans to begin digging up properties and may force families from their homes.  World War II-era rockets and a grenade were found buried underground this week about 1,000 feet behind Odyssey Middle School and just yards from the Warwick subdivision.  Lennar home builders told the homeowners that a munitions consultant they recently hired identified metal objects on all 54 of their home sites. "What happens next is that we go in and start digging these things out of the ground," Lennar Division President Wayne Broedel said.  Related builder story: KB Home's $1.9M Taxpayer Bomb Clean up

Republican lawmaker switches parties
State House Democrats extended their majority Thursday when Republican Debbie Stafford switched parties. Stafford voted against her former party last year on a bill that gave homebuyers more power to sue their builders for shoddy construction. At the time, she complained that Republicans and homebuilder lobbyists threatened her political future unless she voted against the bill.

Credit Card Arbitration
On Nov. 15, 2001, a New Hampshire man named Troy T. Cornock received a surprising letter from something called "National Arbitration Forum." Seems this organization claimed he owed money on an MBNA credit card. The credit card company could produce no proof Cornock had opened the account or made any charges. Not to worry. The National Arbitration Forum ruled against the customer anyway, and awarded MBNA $9,446.85...is just one of literally thousands of instances in which the credit card industry has flushed the Constitution--and the requirement for due process of law--down the commode.

Time to Buy or Time to Run?
Let's look at housing industry stocks for an example. With new home sales plummeting, as well as the subprime meltdown and subsequent credit crunch, homebuilders, lenders, and other housing industry stocks are hated right now. And if you read the headlines, you can see why:... Miller's fund holds 3% of its assets in Countrywide, and another 2% combined in Pulte (NYSE: PHM) and KB Homes (NYSE: KBH). "We've been wrong to own them for the past year and a half," Miller told Bloomberg News. "But if we didn't own them now, we would be buying them like crazy."

Stricken man, family are handed new setback
It's been nine months since Scott Slade collapsed and became paralyzed. It also has been nine months since Slade's wife, Kathy, became so distraught over his collapse that she went into premature labor and gave birth to twins five weeks early – one so fragile the 4-pound infant spent weeks in intensive care. So after surviving all this, yesterday should have been a happy homecoming for Slade, 44, who was returning from a Denver rehabilitation hospital. But his return was shattered by the discovery Monday of toxic mold in the family's three-year-old house in 4S Ranch.

Attorney General Abbott Urges Top Lenders, Loan Services To Address Growing Housing Crisis
Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott today proposed a series of foreclosure prevention measures to three of the largest mortgage lending and loan servicing companies. At a meeting convened by the Attorney General, the industry leaders were asked to implement several important measures that are designed to prevent Texans from losing their homes to foreclosure. By the end of next year, approximately $600 billion worth of subprime adjustable-rate mortgages are expected to reset into higher monthly payments for homeowners across the country. During today's meeting, Attorney General Abbott urged Countrywide Mortgage, Houston-based Litton Loan Servicing and Dallas-based EMC Mortgage to implement several measures designed to preserve homeownership in Texas, improve consumer communication, and resolve complaints.